REPRESENTATIVES from the Baguio City Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Office (CDRRMO) and the Baguio City Council welcomed the donation of P200 million for the Smart City Command Center, which is expected to be established starting February 2020.

With the establishment of the command center, CDRRMO representative Glenn Lardizabal said the city is expecting a synchronized system of responding to different needs in terms of peace and order, environment, and disaster, among others.

“It is actually one of the endeavors of our mayor. The response mechanism of Baguio City should be centralized. And recently, the funding that came from the National Government was just handed over to the city and this 911 Command Center would cater to all calls, incidents that may happen within Baguio. And when we say all incidents, it would be regardless if it is police, fire, medical or emergency cases. All will be catered by this command center,” Lardizabal said.

The smart city system facility will have a closed-circuit television system (CCTV) all over in the city. It will oversee and monitor the security, traffic, disaster response, environment, lighting analytics, daily communication, and calls for emergency response, among others.

The system is adapted from command centers in Europe, the United States, Australia, Singapore, India, China, and Japan, among others. The state-of-the-art facility will be the first of its kind in the country.

Technical experts present in the city worked on their concepts and advancement of the technology that will be used for the command center.

“The command center will be established at the City Engineers Compound or at the motor pool compound at the City Camp Lagoon area and is expected to start by January. Suppliers are presently assessing the area to identify the needs that we really need,” CDRRMO stated.

Senator Christopher Lawrence “Bong” Go recently handed the P200 million check to Baguio City Mayor Benjamin Magalong during the launching of the Malasakit Center at the Baguio General Hospital and Medical Center.